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Chapter Text

After dispelling the child ghost, Hanguang-jun leaves promptly.

Before that, though, he lets the vibration of the qin strings from the last note of Rest linger. One of the crowd of observers coughs. Another shuffles his feet. Still Lan Wangji listens, until the small movements of a living populace trying to be quiet inevitably muffle the last trace of sound. Even then, though the cultivator in white breathes steadily, his face and body remain motionless, like the fine jade carvings they have been called. He holds position for a count of eight slow thudding heartbeats. Then, at last, he lifts his hands from his guqin.

Wangji-qin whispers away in a sparkle of qi interference.

For all their beauty, those little lights, like fireflies at dusk, are the closest thing to gracelessness that Lan Wangji will allow himself in public.

Only a cultivator would understand that this action, sliding a first class spiritual instrument out of common reality and into its paired qiankun case, should in theory be done too smoothly to create those telltale sparks. The energy mesh of any array creates patterns of resonance that can sometimes become visible. Qiankun items are among the most complex arrays in common use. Pockets of potential form when planes of existence are superimposed. Unless carefully controlled, the qi aura of a cultivator spills into these bubbles, filling them to bursting. The more potent the spiritual tool, and the more rapid the spatial exchange, the more difficult it becomes to subtly accomplish the switch. Therefore, only a Lan or a close ally might realize that Hanguang-jun, who excels in both power and precision, could accomplish an ideal performance. Fewer people still know that Lan Wangji can direct multiple streams of energy without losing a drop, calm any rising waves of sound and light before they manifest, settle the turbulent flux of unleashed qi—if he chooses to do so—all with no more difficulty than he has in preventing his emotions from showing on his flawless face.

So, to the onlookers, it's just pretty lights, just one more piece of cultivator magic from their hero.

But, for Wen Ning, his only knowledgeable witness, it’s clearly as angry a gesture as slamming a sword into its scabbard.

Wen Ning shifts his weight onto his back foot, as if tensing to move forward towards his friend. In public, it's better to exhibit some small ordinary reactions that make sense in context. If someone freezes in place for long enough, people are uncomfortably startled when they do finally move—as Hanguang-jun just demonstrated.

Sudden reactions from others tend to rivet Wen Ning's attention. Displays of emotion might or might not be accompanied by a show of power—a surge of spiritual energy like a released sword-glare, a howl of resentment like the shriek of a flute. Regardless, Wen Ning notices, and considers the probable trajectories of the forces in motion. Controlled frustration is especially dangerous, in his system of classification. It will be allowed to explode exactly where the impact is deemed unimportant.

In this instance, though, Wen Ning forgives Lan Wangji fearlessly, as soon as he recognizes Hanguang-jun's quiet fury.

Lan Wangji couldn’t possibly have saved the boy whose ghost he has just released from torment. But he should have been able to.

Wen Ning understands. More: he agrees.

It makes sense that it hurts. Pain isn't blameworthy.

There’s still no easy fix. No end of situations like this.

Wen Ning sighs.

Lan Wangji glides with silent grace away from an altar still laden with gifts for the liberated spirit. His forehead ribbon and long sleeves trail behind him, like the cirrus clouds currently crossing the haze-muddled blue sky. For someone with both the keen perception to catch subtleties and the familiarity to correctly interpet them, it's clearly bleak misery that currently shades Lan Wangji's distant gaze. The sweetest-scented bundles of fresh-cut golden hay, if left outdoors unattended, would fade from their true summer hue to a saddened surface color, a tint to exactly match the present pale straw-yellow of Hanguang-jun's irises. Once deemed unfit for purpose, rightly or not, their fate is to decay and crumble; for even the humblest harvest, neglect means becoming sunbleached and stormscoured, again very like the Second Jade.

Of course the harshest judgment here is Hanguang-jun’s upon himself. Of course.

As soon as Lan Wangji crosses through the cemetary gate, he draws Bichen, soundless and swift. He makes one smoothly continuous action from the pull that first frees the blade from her scabbard, the potent hand-seal that directs the spiritual sword into independent movement, and the single leap that places him atop Bichen while already accelerating. His feet are precisely set for balance on the narrow surface, while his body leans forward into the sudden motion. His long black hair and white ribbon, blown backwards, stream like banners in his wake.

Lan Wangji ascends in a low arc to silently skim over the nearest hedge of flowering bushes, then a row of five small willow trees, and then a slightly taller screen of coppiced woodland planted to deflect the prevailing winds. He's rapidly crossing the tangle of creeks and fields on the outskirts of the village, ready to cover the next few li in a flash, while heading—where?

Ah. He's moving towards the small campsite that he earlier occupied, very near the closest crossroads. In that place, just this morning, he meditated, stretched, and prepared for the final phase of this difficult hunt. There, too, he and Wei Wuxian—and Wen Ning, also—most recently spoke together in what might be termed a private setting.

Since then, though, the campsite has emptied out. Wei Wuxian, burdened with his half of this case's resolution, departed first. A bright young junior called Lan Sizhui provided transportation for Wei Wuxian to return to Cloud Recesses. Thankfully, rumor says, the Yiling Laozu's arcane experiments have been turned to good purpose by righteous Lan influence. He is nonetheless considered an unsettling presence. At this point, Hanguang-jun is the only Lan cultivator remaining on the scene. Where otherwise a large group of juniors and several seniors might be assigned together, he is deemed sufficient to the task, both by himself, and by the Lan authorities. Nonetheless, Wei Wuxian would not want his husband to be alone, of course. So, Wen Ning remained with him.

Now, wordlessly abrupt, devoid of appropriate patience, Lan Wangji has left Wen Ning on his own. Wen Ning, of course, intuits his destination. He speculates silently as to the motivation here. It's just imaginable that perhaps Lan Wangji has fled to better control himself, in private. More plausibly, perhaps he seized the opportunity to escape from suffering through the mandatory exertion of continued self-control, in public, where it means maintaining an appropriate demeanour by ruthless self-denial. At certain moments, Wen Ning knows, Lan Wangji feels unfit to say anything aloud, while inwardly he is silently screaming at the heavens about all the ill-formed aspects of humanity. Rage masquerades as reserve surprisingly easily. Wen Ning, unnatural outcast and onetime stammerer, feels for him.

However, Wen Ning also follows the evidence of his eyes, whatever he imagines. He watches the trajectory of swift brightness first rise and then start to descend, graceful as a white falcon dropping between mountain peaks. Quickly, the Ghost General assesses the situation to determine his next action. Then, decided on where to go, Wen Ning moves to meet his distraught travelling companion there at once.

Wen Ning runs. Not at his fastest pace, for that would rouse and expend energies best left to rest unless he truly needs to unchain them, but far surpassing anything that can be called walking or even jogging. Though it's almost effortless for him now, in honesty, he can't deem it anything less than running. It is not a mode of travel that an ordinary human being could manage. If someone tried to follow his first steps, momentarily matching him at their fastest sprint, they would shortly be forced to slow down or else fall over. Meanwhile, Wen Ning increases his speed from his initial burst of movement. He'll continue accelerating all the way, until he needs either to slow himself towards stopping as he nears his destination, or to kill his momentum abruptly with a skywards leap because he has already arrived.

Wen Ning, on the ground, is as fast as, or faster than, any spiritual cultivator. But while technically capable of handling a spiritual weapon in combat, he absolutely cannot feed one with the qi required to fly a sword. However, as if in partial compensation, he simply doesn’t tire. That's the only trick he truly needs to achieve this wicked turn of speed. Get going, to begin with, as fast as a human being ever can go. Then—keep on going.

Oh, that’s—a bit misleading, Wen Ning reflects as he moves, a gray and black blur whipping through the trees like a windstorm. Truthfully, he tires often. But not like that. Not physically.

Even a fierce corpse can feel a sore heart, though. Even a Ghost General can want to assuage that pain, in the right company, with some kind of understanding.

Chapter Text

Wen Ning finds Lan Wangji at the campsite, as expected. It's a clearing surrounded by medium-sized young maples. Scythed-short grass mixes with straggling wildflowers. The turf is made uneven by trampled-bare patches under the welcoming shade on the north end. The sunny southern section, where people are most likely to pitch a shelter, is shielded by two large stones placed as windbreaks. The very center of the space holds a traveler's hearth laid out as a circle of stones. There is a woodpile, neatly stacked, off to the side. Opposite it stands a large tree, with a wide low branch that would instantly attract Wei Wuxian to lounge lengthwise for flute-playing and husband-teasing purposes, if he were here. A dirt path shows the expected entrance route to the oval of open area.

There's no gate, fence, or doorway, but a long rectangle of cut stone has been laid in the earth as a symbolic, and spiritually useful, threshold. Wen Ning pauses to lay his hand against it in acknowledgement, rather than force his way through. It takes a moment of patience, like shifting the tumblers of a lock with a hairpin rather than using the key, but with long practice and sincere goodwill, the Ghost General enters the space as temporary inhabitant, not undead invader.

Behind him, memorized earlier and noted in passing now only to avoid kicking them over as he blurred to a near-halt, a series of pebble cairns by the path mark out the direction and distance of landmarks. Most prominently, both symbolic rocks and written characters identify the host village. How not, when they have hospitably offered these amenities? Of course, it's in order to tempt travelling merchants into pausing here, rather than pushing on to a proper posting-station inn. They might, perhaps, be aware that cultivators often make use of nearby neutral locations when a complex night-hunt turns into an extended investigation; but the locals probably hoped never to need the campground for that purpose. Helpfully, the stone markers also point out the nearby public well; the stream with a swimming and bathing area that's a bit further on; and an available grazing field with an attached manure-filtering pond, not to be confused with either. A good ways back, closer to the turnoff, one can find signs for the customary pack-route to the closest highway, the placement of an intersecting canal about a half-day's brisk walk past where those roads converge, and finally the next grand milestone en route to the regional capital. When Lan Wangji and his shadow do leave, it might be by sword; but lacking avian instincts for direction, even a cultivator with the energy to spare for full-time flying is best advised to follow landmarks. And, Wen Ning is as likely as not to provide his own transportation.

Ahead of him, Wen Ning sees a different sort of destination. There's a cultivator in white, a vision of immortal beauty that's combined with a remarkable asshole attitude, sitting gloomily on a chunk of cut stump placed upright beside the cold hearth.

Lan Wangi has not fully set up the campsite, even for a short stay. But neither has he washed away the chalk marks indicating occupancy and cleared the area in preparation to leave. Instead, the sacks and rolls of his dunnage, incongrously pure white, rest against one of the sheltering stones. Effectively, he's half-unpacked, even though the drawstrings and clasps of each bag are still shut tight. Anyone keyed to the security talismans can take things in and out of them, now, unlike their entire inaccessibility when they are stored for travel in Hanguang-jun's layered qiankun sleeves.

It would take hardly any time for someone already familiar with the spot to light a small fire, especially with the use of talismans. Tea could be brewed in little longer than the steeping itself requries. It would be quicker still for Lan Wangji to just unstopper a water bottle for a soothing sip. Then, either choice could so easily be followed by preparing a simple meal, or at least by unfolding the leaf wrappings around one of the direly nutritious Gusu Lan travel rations. Or else, knowing Lan Wangji's sense of duty, once his simplest immediate needs were met, he might unroll paper and paperweights, unpack brush and inkstone, and begin grinding the ink to start composing a field report.

Despite all these options, at the moment Lan Wangji is just sitting there, hands loosely clasped, staring at nothing.

Sorrowing, if one wanted to dignify his bowed head and slumped shoulders. Statuesque, to draw focus instead to the aesthetic contrast he currently presents. On the one hand, there is the tall handsome figure: solemn, silent, a flowing form frozen into motionlessness like the smoothly iced-over crest of a snow-filled cirque. On the other, there's his location: the middle of a lively summer meadow, filled with small colorful blossoms and busy bees and the call and response of birdsong. Certainly, there is a severity implied by the spiritual sword now restored to his side. Nobility, too, is shown by the tall silver guan spiking upwards from his perfectly arranged hair. Beauty and wealth and self-knowledge and self-confidence, those appear also, if the onlooker attends to the details of his exquisite clothing. The frost-white sparkling silks of his talisman-embroidered outer garments, Gusu Lan Sect's standard attire in its most refined mode, are complemented by Hanguang-jun's selection of an oceanic ombre of inner layers. They range from a seafoam shimmer of pale blue-green lace, to the translucent teal beneath that, then there are shades upon shades of indigo-blue, and lastly the innermost visible edge shows solid black. In sum, Lan Wangji clearly has the qualities of a gentleman, and his personal appearance itself is a kind of calligraphy in a resource-intensive language few people can afford to utilize. Yet due to his very refinement, like some celestial spirit, he seems strangely well suited in any setting, however incongrouous. Elegant and still, he resembles a pearlescent white pond-lily amid the colorful wildflowers. Who could see him like this and resist waxing poetic?

Wen Ning would call his behavior sulking, though.

Wen Ning has not gotten this far by reserving judgment; if he were the sort of person to let things go easily, he would've stayed dead. There are better ways to handle being upset than abandoning the aftermath of a serious situation. Even if the people left behind really do deserve to have to figure out how to deal with their own mess for once.

Wen Ning tips his head to the side to look at Lan Wangji severely. Wen Ning's eyes don't narrow, nor does he frown; and while his footfalls on first coming into the clearing were doubtless audible, he's extremely quiet now. He is noticed, anyway. The smallest shift in Lan Wangji's shoulders acknowledges that he feels duly scrutinized. He continues to look away, though, which indicates that he is not chastened.

Oh, Lan Wangji would have stayed if he thought he had to. He left because he could. All the truly necessary aspects of the case either were previously handled, or were assigned elsewhere. Or, they were thoroughly taken care of—banished outright—by his own qin music, just today. Undoubtedly, Hanguang-jun knew as much, with the certainty of his extensive experience in night-hunting. He will remain unapologetic for his unforgiving attitude. Still, Lan Wangji is also probably angry at himself for even wanting, let alone deciding, to storm off. To flee the scene, effectively, as soon as it was neither negligence nor cowardice to do so.

After all, one could argue that that makes it, instead, just a display of petty self-indulgence.

Wen Ning lets his gaze drop, and folds his hands in front of him. With small movements, he tests the care and gentleness with which he can make each finger come to rest overlapping its counterpart. He is not Lan Qiren. Neither is he the kind of Wen his own uncle would have made of him. Wen Ning understands forgiving fallibility as an available choice.

Though Wen Ning has met far worse, he knows Lan Wangji does judge himself harshly enough to constitute a problem. Lan Wangji also routinely overestimates his own endurance for awkward social situations. Though Hanguang-jun would say, if pressed to explain himself, that there was no truly qualifying reason for him to remain, still he's not such a black-and-white thinker as to imagine that this gets him off the hook entirely. So, precisely because it really is a minor matter, something for which nobody will expect formal discipline, Lan Wangji is liable to fret. As he is merely tired and sad and disappointed, rather than transcendantly angry, he's currently at his least able to defend against self-accusation. It will occur to him that departing suddenly should count as an unworthy action on his part; a sign that he must be either petulant or inept.

Well, maybe Wen Ning is projecting his own anxieties there, a little. Lan Wangji could be mourning the accumulated sorrows of the world, for all he knows. Or, perhaps, he is harshly critiquing himself much as Wen Ning imagines, but for something completely different. A missed note or a broken guqin string or something like that.

Wen Ning moves one foot, scuffing the dirt a little. Lan Wangji takes a deeper breath, and angles himself minutely further away.

It could be worse. Lan Wangji could be writing lines already, instead of contemplating cloud-shadows.

Or...he could have stayed put. He might have listened to the townsfolk, through gritted teeth if necessary. Then, likely, he would have heard them being humanly hypocritical, making the sort of excuses that come up whenever the still-living try to assure one another that the problems of the recently-dead are absolutely not their fault. If pressed far enough, Lan Wangji might have found some petty, crushing, perfectly justifiable way to let off pressure, and probably started an argument.

(Lan Wangji's spouse absolutely would have riled people up, on purpose. But Wei-gongzi—no—Wei Wuxian actually likes arguing.)

Wen Ning blinks away some specks of dust, startling a small white butterfly, as he belatedly expresses a feeling of realization.

Yes, Wen Ning might have handled things differently, were he the one occupying Lan Wangji's fancy white boots! But he has no intention of demanding that Lan Wangji turn around now. Nor, that he hasten home to Cloud Recesses, there to consult with Wei Wuxian (usefully) and Lan Qiren (less usefully, typically) and his elders (not useful at all). None of that seems helpful.

Sure, Wen Ning consulted on the night-hunt just concluded. The intersection of proper medical knowledge and hard-won expertise in resentment once again came in handy. He didn't lead the investigation. Unless he's temporarily placed in charge of a gaggle of fluffy-duckling juniors, Wen Ning has nonexistent authority over any Gusu Lan disciples, at all. He much prefers to keep things that way.

So, rather than (metaphorically) attempt to yank the leg of the person flying the sword, Wen Ning thinks he would rather smooth the way forward. He wants to encourage Lan Wangji to decide for himself what he needs to do next. In the near future, when he's clearheaded. Which, at the moment, he plainly is not.

Well, then.

Wen Ning walks up to Lan Wangji with neither haste, now that he's been visually re-located, nor stealth. Instead, Wen Ning lets his feet drag through the dust and grass, and his clothing shift and rustle. Cautiously, he lays a hand on Lan Wangji's shoulder.

Lan Wangji sighs, and looks up at him, and covers Wen Ning's hand with his own. He grips it briefly, but with startling strength.

Then, Lan Wangji lets go, straightens his shoulders, folds his legs properly so he's sitting tailor-fashion atop the rough-cut seat, and forms a mountain peak with his hands in front of his navel. He resumes staring at nothing. Meditating—if you can call it that. His miserable blankness suggests that even if he does manage to drop into actual meditation, it will only develop any useful amount of spiritual energy for his core as the result of his sheer stubbornness.

Aiya. Lans. They are all terrible. They take the rule of be strict with oneself in entirely the wrong way. Even the married-in and adopted ones. Wen Ning has become certain of it.

Time for serious measures, then. Wen Ning starts unpacking.

After putting the campsite in order, Wen Ning decides to make an offer to Lan Wangji. Explicitly.

Since Wen Ning started recreating the camp, Lan Wangji has permitted himself to almost relax. He's still holding himself tensely. He sipped the tea to which Wen Ning pointedly added a little honey, nodded or shook his head with opinions about camp furniture, pointed with his chin to where Wen Ning could affix a shielding talisman to a tree, rubbed a beeswax-based salve into the qin callouses on his fingertips when Wen Ning handed that particular little wooden box to him. But he's not said much. Nor, more concerningly, has he allowed himself to really focus on Wen Ning.

"Look," Wen Ning says, and only that. Patiently, he waits for Lan Wangji to turn towards him.

Lan Wangji will take a passing conversational interjection literally. But only because he knows, with Wen Ning, he can be that honest. History is heavy between them; they have threatened each other, have held each other; they know what it means to pay attention.

So Lan Wangji does look at Wen Ning, though only briefly. That gaze scorches like sunlight. Hanguang-jun's arrogant assurance is always present, but to be at the focus of his regard is very different than being dismissed to blend into the background. Yet, whether he considers violent intent or intense appreciation, it's similarly searing, a brilliance that living eyes and skin could hardly bear. Lan Wangji scans over Wen Ning directly, observing every detail at once. He leans forward slightly, a small movement that speaks of checking the potential for an overwhelming reaction.

It's unmistakable that Lan Wangji cares what Wen Ning will choose to do next. Wen Ning knows that he has the privilege now, as once he did not, of also understanding that Lan Wangji cares for him. That honor was hard earned. Wen Ning still questions how he could possibly deserve it.

"You'll feel better if you let it out. Sparring, or sex?" Wen Ning asks frankly.

He gets a second look, then. Lan Wangji's eyes reexamine Wen Ning's strong but slender figure, fading into every shadow in his unassuming dark robes. Likewise, Wen Ning's dark-veined pale hands, their movements long clumsily impaired; but now made deft and certain, in every action he's taken to transform open clearing back into overnight camp, with the application of refined talismans. He lingers on Wen Ning's small smile.

“Not obligation,” Lan Wangji half-asks. His amber eyes now look aside entirely, turning towards the edge of the clearing. Lan Wangji is not staring at Wen Ning, and not politely glancing down either. Still, he’s plainly listening. His body turns towards Wen Ning, with his shoulders squared up, expressing a studied dignity. Meanwhile his hands rest half-open, receptive. That odd mismatch of sideways gaze and attentive posture is typical for Lan Wangji. Right now, it superficially resembles shyness. But this is also one of the ways Lan Wangji has of deflecting the power of his presence. He shields both himself and his interlocutor from his innate intensity.

“No,” Wen Ning says, and waits. Lan Wangji lifts an eyebrow.

“I won’t deny that I might offer out of duty, if I thought that would help,” Wen Ning answers. He allows a rueful twist to his smile, coloring what is conveyed by his soft even voice. A touch of gentle self-deprecation seems like the very minimum this admission deserves.

That moment of expressiveness has its cost; it warms the talisman bracelet on his wrist. The sensation of warmth is an intentional warning sign that he has just emptied one of the many carved beads. Each bead is a tiny talismanic vessel, filled like a flask with pre-shaped power. The assemblage offers, for his convenience, an assortment of small ways in which Wen Ning can temporarily alter himself—either to simulate, or to surpass, ordinary human abilities. Wen Ning is not overly concerned by the alert. It does give him ideas.

“But it’s not that, and never will be," Wen Ning continues calmly. "You would not wish it; and I would not lie to you."

Lan Wangji sighs. Wen Ning reads an unspoken apology in the soft exhalation. He acknowledges it with a shrug of his shoulders.

While this won’t be the first time for him and Lan Wangji together, it still seems like there always must be some excuse. It is as if the joy of intimacy, in itself, is insufficient reason to reach for it. Like they are, or have become, the kind of people who must make everything difficult for themselves; who cannot believe in pleasure that doesn’t have an edge of hurt.

However, Wen Ning can say with self-confidence that what might seem like an excuse, is not. He has no need and no wish to conceal his motive for offering sexual intimacy to one of the vanishingly few people he trusts.

Simply, Wen Ning sees Lan Wangji’s current pain, and would like to provide a balm for it.

Truthfully, Wen Ning wants everything that comes with intimately comforting Lan Wangji. Sex is excellent for both giving and receiving reassurance. Also, Wen Ning wants to interact with Hanguang-jun, Lan Wangji, Lan Zhan, in one of the few ways guaranteed to gain his absolute attention. Wen Ning has so much to say to Lan Wangji. Most of it is better said wordlessly. Wen Ning has so little to offer, otherwise, that won’t turn to ashes in his hands.

Then, one more spark. Each of the thoughts he turns over are lanterns, lighting up one by one to guide him. Wen Ning realizes: he, too, is grieving the ghost they just laid to Rest. He wouldn’t mind a distraction.

Chapter Text

Lan Wangji inhales deeply. Exhales with a willed calm. This is a cultivator discipline: to let go of the extraneous. To act wholeheartedly.

"Then, I would be grateful," Lan Zhan says simply. He allows the corners of his mouth to shift into a small smile. But, that expression is still terribly controlled, too-placid in its accepting warmth. It might well look more at home on Lan Xichen's features than on the younger brother's face. He does not reach for Wen Ning—not yet.

Wen Ning shakes his head, chuckling. Is this really so serious? His laughter is, he thinks, not the same as it once was. It's something lost and replaced, repaired with a borrowed pattern, damaged once more and patched anew. And that's okay.

Lan Wangji's fingers tighten on his own knee. It's a small movement, but a forceful one. His knuckles turn briefly and bloodlessly pale from extreme pressure. Then he makes himself let go. As he does, Wen Ning reaches for him. This time, Lan Wangji allows their hands to clasp each other, palm to palm.

Two of Wen Ning's fingers tap the inside of Lan Wangji's forearm, implying a silent question. Wen Ning's other hand extends, offering his wrist if Lan Wangji chooses to grasp it, and to take control. A blink, and the smallest downturn of Lan Wangji's lips, leaves Wen Ning's next movement in his own determination instead.

Wen Ning nods assent. His loose hair slides back and forth over his shoulders, dragging over the folded hood of the cloak sewn with qiankun pockets that he wears instead of visible quiver-harness and sword-belt. Concealment allows him to sidestep endless arguments around false judgments and real threats. Some things don't need to be overt in order to be meaningful.

Wen Ning fumbles for Hanguang-jun's sash, and the pristine Second Jade of Lan allows the dust-gray hands of a fierce corpse to begin unwrapping his clothing.

Wen Ning can't manage to be hasty, while assisting Lan Wangji in taking off his complex attire. At least Wen Ning manages to attain brisk and hint at eager without quite tipping over into laundry hazard.

As they take turns to touch, Lan Wangji relieves Wen Ning of his working gear and his outer layers. By gently shifting Lan Wangji's hands further up his body when they wander downwards, Wen Ning indicates that he'll keeps his undergarments on, along with a few important accessories, for the time being. Unhelpfully, Lan Wangji chooses next to toy with Wen Ning's hair, braiding bits of it from near his forehead to tuck behind Wen Ning's ears. Then he ties the long thin braids together in back like a ribbon. Well—that might be useful, a bit. For certain activities. Wen Ning smiles up at Lan Wangji while he's down by his legs, undoing the side ties of his underpants. Lan Zhan's ears blush.

Like that, giving and taking hints, they move around each other, as coordinated as an improvisational dance, and as likely to incorporate compensating for stumbles. Meanwhile, the vigor of the fierce corpse's motions rattles around the bead necklace he wears, though he's careful not to let it get caught on anything. Ah, that is a good symbol, in its way. As simple and as fraught as Hanguang-jun's lovely ribbon. That self-chosen collar—that tool he couldn't invent himself, and wouldn't willingly accept without major input, and yet didn't ultimately reject anyway—that strand which he wears by day and night: it literally helps him to stay in control. As he is now, Wen Ning uses tools to manage his body and mind. He tempers madness and hunger artificially, in a way that the imaginary perfection of a completely healthy living body would never require. Wen Ning knew already when he was alive and studying medicine, and now he knows with doubled experience as the walking product of ghostly cultivation: not one earthly embodiment is faultless.

Likewise, not every decision requires singlemindedness. Wen Ning has more than just compassion for Lan Wangji. He has some affectionately pragmatic reminders to express, too. It's okay to be sidetracked sometimes, or silly, or spontaneous. It's not a fatal moral failure if one's attempted pure focus still includes traces of impure intentions. Wen Ning would like to suggest that the white light of transcendent serenity can still be inspiring, even though, in daily practice, it is bound to become polluted—or prismatically colorful, depending how one sees it—due to the admixture of mundane needs and ordinary imperfections. Lan Wangji, like many who try to hold themselves to too high a standard, could stand to let his lofty intentions touch the living ground from time to time.

So, Lan Wangji doesn't need to be ready to act with total commitment the second he's agreed. He doesn't need to refuse, due to not being certain how things will go, either. There's nothing nailing him down to either taking advantage or holding back. He's allowed to hesitate; to want something that's not easily explained; to make interim agreements; and to change his mind if he wants to.

Lan Wangji can speak and act for himself. So, now, can Wen Ning.

Wen Ning smiles. He decides that he will take Lan Zhan with his mouth first, if that's on offer. He means to luxuriate in it.

They begin from a strangely chaste half-embrace, standing beside an open bed-roll, hands on each other's shoulders, faces slightly upturned, in partial nudity and complete mindfulness. They breathe, Wen Ning intentionally matching Lan Wangji's guiding movement, the pattern of air between his parted lips and small cyclical shifts of his diaphragm. There is no signal given, but they realize together when to move on.

Wen Ning sinks slowly, slowly to his knees.

Now, he breathes into his motions. He doesn't need to breathe, necessarily; but occupying the shape of a human body, he is still equipped for breath. It feels natural to set a rhythm that way. It helps him to find the harmony between apparently disparate objects, to attain the alignment of body parts that will flow correctly in this moment. Even in this altered existance, Wen Ning is still a cultivator in the ways that matter most to him, when he chooses to acknowledge that truth. He guides himself with his intentions, directs his body along with his breath, and acts in harmony with his heart.

As Wen Ning descends into a position that will evoke the dynamic he currently wants, Hanguang-jun, or at least a sizable part of him, is rising to the occasion. Lan Wangji's breathing grows deeper, and his hands clench at his sides, as his cock hardens, as yet untouched. Wen Ning helps him along, but indirectly, tracing the backs of his knees, the juncture of thighs and groin, the seam between his balls, with the light touch of cool fingers.

Once he's worked up enough for this to be pleasant, not an uncomfortable shock like tossing someone chilled by freezing rain into hot water or dropping chunks of ice and snow onto someone sweat-bathing, Wen Ning lips and mock-bites lightly at Lan Zhan's sensitive stomach and tender inner thighs for a moment. Next, he arranges himself dead center of those utterly gorgeous carved-column legs. At last, after all this delicate dancing around, he sucks the whole head of Lan Zhan's cock right into his mouth.

Taking even just that much of his cock, only going so far as to fit his lips around the rigid shaft right beneath where the crown flares wider, is already a good-sized mouthful. The solid weight and rounded shape are pleasing. Moreso, probably, since Wen Ning, unlike any mortal lover, isn't the least bit concerned about choking on him. It's sort of like putting a ripe plum into his mouth whole instead of nibbling at it.

This requires bit more work, by comparison, before Wen Ning can taste him properly, though. No breaking skin involved, either. Definitely no red pulp. But despite this being such a mouth-focused activity, Wen Ning isn't really worried that he'll slip up and succumb to the instinct to bite. He's not a mindless creature of impulse, despite what his self-doubts try to tell him from time to time.

No, he wants to hold Lan Zhan, safe within his body. He wants to explore the smoothness of the taut skin at the tip of his cock and the resilient heft of his shaft; to trick himself into feeling a little more alive with the vibrant nearness of his skin and sweat; and to savor those quick little breaths and small sounds of encouragement. Wants him, just wants him, wants to swallow over and over like sucking on a pebble to stave off thirst, wants to gently slide him out of his diligent staidness like spitting out a slippery melon seed, wants to crack him open damage-free with a delicate touch like breathing on an imprinted wax seal to pull it off still whole; wants to draw him inwards, sensitive head and soft foreskin and thick hard tapering length, so very tenderly, like, yes, suckling on a nipple.

Wen Ning starts by swirling his tongue around, slow strokes like trying to taste every bit of the surface of a glazed fruit. He keeps comparing this activity to food, despite how long it's been since he actually needed to eat. But it's the closeness, the sharing, the trust, that feels nourishing, really. Wen Ning slowly starts to pump one hand up and down Lan Zhan's cock while also beginning to bob his head a little. Lan Zhan has both his hands sunk in Wen Ning's hair, and is humming to him. It's wonderful.

Oral sex is, Wen Ning has decided, a favorite. It is such a pure way of giving pleasure. Enjoyable in its own right, yes. But for Wen Ning, anyway, it's satisfying like cooking a meal for someone is, not like sitting down to eat. He's not hungry; he's thirsty for affection. He likes to be appreciated. Likes to give. Likes to not have to be the center of attention. Giving stimulation to the point of orgasm with his mouth demands his absolute focus on the task in front of him. The outcome he can achieve benefits from his ever-increasing skills and his honest enthusiasm, both. Satisfying his partner makes him feel downright triumphant, as self-satisfied as a cat that's gotten into the cream.

Wen Ning sucks, and sucks; swipes wide licks and flickers smaller ones; moves his head back and forth; swallows, and swallows. The helpful pooling of saliva in his mouth is another handy trick, stinging his wrist with the talisman bracelet's response, slickness to smooth over the texture of tongue and cheeks, hard palate and soft palate. The thrumming sense of rising yang energy centered on Lan Zhan's cock is a reminder that Wen Ning has additional reasons to appreciate this activity.

Probably, it's a good thing that, as a fierce corpse, Wen Ning's facial expressions and other reactions are consciously controlled, and not reflexive. It wouldn't be especially socially acceptable for the dreaded Ghost General to go around smirking foolishly at people. Especially not Yiling Laozu's husband.

Wen Ning, as he swallows hard and accepts Lan Wangji fully into his throat, as he bodily drags Lan Zhan in even closer with hands on his hips and mouth enveloping him, as he keeps his thick blood-hot cock deep inside while moving on him fast and tight like nobody else can do without stopping to breathe, is in accord with him that they both desire and agree to this. Yet there’s a tension there anyway. A battle to be fought, with the two of them allied against Lan Wangji's renewed anger, despair, and sorrow over injustice.

Maybe that’s why they only fuck when things are going wrong—unlike Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji, who simply can’t keep their hands off of each other, and have ritualized their noncomformist displays of affection. Now that they, Wen Ning and Lan Zhan, have been not just physically but emotionally intimate, now that there is no question of Wen Ning leaving, they are no longer actively struggling to define what this strange sideways sort of relationship is or ought to be. Wen Ning is here, not striking out to leave the past behind. He chooses to accompany Lan Wangji, who accepts him. For now, that suffices. This particular bond doesn't seem to require either the constant reaffirmation or the sexual satisfaction that Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian give each other daily.

Oh, Lan Wangji, generous to a fault with the few people he lets himself cherish, would gladly ask Wen Ning to his bed just for the pleasure of it—if Wen Ning wanted. But there would be nothing much in it for Wen Ning, then. Not unless Wen Ning could give Lan Wangji something he can’t otherwise get. So he would answer no, if asked. Therefore, Lan Wangji does not ask him.

Unless he needs to, in a sense. Unless Lan Zhan wants to, because some part of him is split knuckles, frayed ribbon, bruised forearm where he blocked a tree-branch hurled by an angry spirit, charcoal smudged in his eyelashes because he’d rather sit alone in the cold or restart a cooled campfire than accept hospitality from people he feels he failed. Unless there is a threat for Wen Ning to stand against, a gap he can bridge with his body.

(If he were here and available, not occupied with defanging the serpent's nest of self-devouring resentment that was the other half of this case, Wei Wuxian would intervene, first. In fact, Wei Wuxian would neither ask, not expect to be asked. He and Lan Wangji hold an agreement of absolute trust between them, an insane devotion that supersedes asking and answering, expressing gratitude or offering apologies. Wen Ning, on the other hand, is determinedly deliberate with his words.)

Wen Ning is still fervently, almost violently appreciating Lan Zhan's body, thick cock and strong thighs and roaming hands, even while he coolly muses over his own motivations. With suction, tightness, pressure, movement, he's dragging an increasing response out of his acutely interested, but slow to be satisfied, partner. Wen Ning switches repeatedly between two modes: using his hands and his mouth in tandem, with caution for his sharp nails; and leaning inwards while bracing himself to take in Lan Zhan's whole cock at once. He knows he's good at this, knows he's made his differences work for him.

(If Wei Wuxian were there, sex would happen between the married couple instead, and it's probable that Wen Ning would absent himself. But that wouldn’t be the only part of the comfort offered, nor even the most important part. Cuddling and listening and letting Lan Wangji say what he needs to in the awkwardest way imaginable would really be more central. With Wen Ning there, and Wei Wuxian not for the moment, things are different. Lan Wangji won’t verbally or musically unburden himself to Wen Ning the way he does to his zhiji, his husband; not out of any reticence but simply because they are different people. But he can let Wen Ning touch him; for a long-snarled tangle of reasons, he doesn’t shy away from that touch. And Wen Ning, unlike Wei Wuxian, rarely needs people to explain themselves to him to understand the nuances of their upset. To be allowed to respond to it is communication enough.)

Wen Ning is very responsive now, in a brutally intentional way, giving Lan Zhan's cock endless slick moving pressure where he can't supply simple heat. He makes Lan Zhan work for it too, going along with his attempts to back off, to maintain steady focus under the increasing sensation, but insistently offering more as well. Finally, Lan Zhan rakes his nails over Wen Ning's shoulders wherever he can reach, grabs the back of his head, and thrusts hard into his wide-stretched mouth.

When, and only when, he's as angry as he is mournful, as unaccustomed to renewed sorrow as he is accustomed to satisfying lust—then, yes, perhaps Lan Wangji might consider asking Wen Ning to indulge him. In the handful of circumstances that so far have fit those parameters, though, Wen Ning has been too quick off the mark, offering, for him to have yet managed to ask.

Intense, so incredibly intense now, racing towards breaking free into limitless ascent. It's still a long aching agony of wanting, a frenzy of opposing forces aligning head and hips, before Lan Wangji finally crests the first crashing wave of pleasure. A waterfall of yang energy thunders over Wen Ning's entire body when Lan Zhan's seed shoots into his throat. Wen Ning works the muscles of his mouth relentlessly throughout the expected overwhelming expansion of his senses, extending the moment of Lan Zhan's climax. He slows down only when there's no way Lan Zhan will offer him more immediately, though he's still hard and heavy inside, stretching open Wen Ning's jaw.

Wen Ning knows the contrasting temperature of his mouth will start to seem freezing soon, not merely luxuriantly cool. The instinctive need of his body is to demand more, either to extract additional arousal, or to drag out a sharper response still with some clawing attack that draws blood. Thwarted of those means, even his kisses will bring dizziness, and his closer touch the feel of burning ice, as his bodily presence pulls in breath and body heat to distill even the thinnest mist of living qi from any hint of humid vitality. Wen Ning struggles to even try to draw back, let alone to begin cycling his resentful energy into a sustainably stable circulation. Gladly, Wen Ning accepts Lan Wangji's hand on his jaw, thumb on his cheekbone, guiding him part of the way off. It's both infuriating and thrilling that Lan Zhan pauses them partway, to rest there a moment, with the head of Lan Zhan's cock still pressing down on Wen Ning's tongue. This, then, is Wen Ning's only involuntary reaction; the closest thing to arousal in all this, for him. Given the addictive, intoxicating, empowering, overwhelming gift of living qi, he wants, wants, wants more.

The wanting is its own kind of high; he savors it, rides it out, wrings himself out emotionally with the tempting pleasure and the harsh restraint of it, quaking mentally though he retains physical control. In the process of finally removing his mouth, moving slowly for the sake of enjoyment and intimacy both but without daring to hesitate or linger, he licks all around Lan Zhan’s shaft with an appreciative tongue, suckles the last drops of semen from the tip of his still-hard cock, pulls back not close-mouthed yet but inhaling the scent of his satisfaction with flared nostrils and open jaws that ache to devour him anew. He withdraws as he must, then, seperating himself just far enough to press grateful close-lipped kisses along Lan Wangji’s thighs, lips cool against the tempting throb of the arteries of the thigh. He is conscious of the fact that he forces himself to breathe. The pain of self-denial is like life renewed. Like the rending sensation of openly weeping, it is a relief.

“Good,” says Lan Wangji, just when Wen Ning regains his confidence in the self-control he never actually lost. His hand is still on the back of Wen Ning's neck. A simple and warm weight of restraint, accepted willingly. Lan Wangji is excellent at this, at holding certainty in the wake of an experience that turns everything inside out. Lan Wangji thanks him, praises him, lets him know what to do. Assesses him conditionally and sums him up accordingly. Gives him a place, a purpose, and offers every option imaginable in what to make of it, but not without watching him. Deems him acceptable for now, and only for now.

And that—

— unlike that other love, that other fire, those scarlet eyes tear-softened and staring into him, that utterly bewildered and beloved voice asking, “Forgive you—for—?”, and no, that is impossible—

—that much, Wen Ning can accept.

Chapter Text

In the wordless warm pause that follows the retreat from climax, Lan Zhan strokes Wen Ning's hair. Wen Ning has always enjoyed that gesture, from family and friends and lovers alike. It's such a simple form of appreciation, so easy to accept, to be petted like a beloved cat, to nestle his head against someone like a small child. For half his life, Wen Qing's hand on his brow was the only touch that ever meant real approval. For a great portion of his waking, walking, wearisome, undeath, Wei Wuxian's touch commanded his truth instead. More symbol than sensation, for years now, but still he seeks it out.

Wen Ning's hair has tangles and knots, he knows, a lopsided circlet of impromptu braids and possibly a few stray leaves from the forest. Lan Wangji smooths his exquisite musician's hands over it all.

It was Lan Wangji’s raised brow and his offer of Wen Ning’s own comb while they gathered their things this morning that spurred Wen Ning to put his hair in what little lasting order it presently possesses: falling freely to his shoulders while partly gathered with a loose tail on top, tied only with a twist of grass. He could have asked for a ribbon from the market, something with sheen and width and color to it. But he prefers not to. It is deeply satisfying to need so very little. Whatever happens, coincidentally, to be at hand for him to pick up, supplies him well enough.

Wen Ning would lose the comb, too, deliberately, were it not a gift. He would leave it in his rucksack, but Lan Wangji keeps some of his things in qiankun pouches instead, needlessly sparing him burdens. A bond of trust, of sorts, in that Wen Ning depends on the spiritual cultivator to fetch them out again; but one that weighs lightly. Wen Ning doesn’t truly require boot-polish and brushes, spare buttons and waxed thread. Not when he is fundamentally indifferent to weather and scorn alike.

To keep him attached to his current role and identity, they have need of more binding rituals than the simple touch of straw or silk. Wen Ning, undead and unchained, can only be meaningfully affected by what is taken and given despite society’s rules. He fears neither sun nor darkness, fire nor ice. Few things move him deeply. Oaths, bloodshed, supplication, devastation. Or—a willing kiss.

Wen Ning’s half-bound hair is, perhaps, an inarticulate protest against civilized human expectations; but a half-hearted one. Or else, maybe, it is an equally imperfect effort at participation; a misshapen move towards joining in, instead. An attempt at caring or complying or communicating; but one that, quite intentionally, reaches only far enough to halfway bridge the obvious gap. Lan Wangji will have to reach out, also, if he wants to meet Wen Ning there.

So far, he does. So far, he would rather that Wen Ning not fall away into the wilderness. Will not leave him in the closed and lonely dark. As long as these things are true, Wen Ning will neither run nor fight against allowing a long leash, now held by Lan Wangji, in lieu of any other. No, rather, almost he looped it around his neck himself, like a garland of flowers.

Wen Ning must test that tie anyway. Not jump, no. But lean towards the edge, a little, to feel the hand on his wrist. A shackle could be terror or worse; should seem, at best, the grimmest of cold comfort, for one who fears himself as Wen Ning does. Would be a horror, from anyone else, anyone at all. There are bonds he must refuse whatever the temptation to submit. Other chains he has broken with great prejudice. Wen Ning is quite capable of cold deliberate choice. Merely to feel an attempt at restraint will not freeze his actions. The likely consequences of defiance are meaningless to him—and, too, the costs of compliance are likewise negligible. He is a power, in his small way. His own will determines whether he submits, at last. Because of how he has suffered, and caused suffering, he can no longer be tame. He has, also, a reckless fearlessness of powers greater still...save one.

In all likelihood, Wen Ning cannot be confined again. Not beyond the slight extent to which he willingly accepts direction within a subtle and socially-tied chain of command. Or, if he could be bound again, taken again—then that would be the death of his present self—one way or another. Inasmuch as he is able, Wen Ning refuses to fear what he has already undergone. Still, his curiosity is not great enough to make that trial. So, he remains himself; he endures being his own creature, with complications. He is stronger for being able to choose this yielding. No mortal chain nor even immortal binding net is sufficient to hold him. But a gesture of affectionate trust, light and strong as a silken ribbon—that will serve the purpose.

And no, Hanguang-jun’s Lan ribbon does not, will not bind Wen Ning’s hands to each other, nor tie his wrist to Lan Wangji’s. Wen Ning is not so privileged. He would not ask to be. Yet Wen Ning has held that ribbon in his hands anyway. Has woven it into Lan Zhan’s hair. He fits into a gap, permissible only while it remains unspoken.

Surely there is a grace in service, though one that that should not be quite the same as the love of family. But for him, perhaps it is all one thing. Wen Ning knows that it is one mark among his many flaws, that he stumbles heedless over that threshold.

Hanguang-jun has taken a generous interpretation of their close ties. He could have diminished Wen Ning's presence in his life to near-nothing, so readily. Instead, for Wen Ning, Lan Wangji chooses to shed light.

Wen Ning would, he thinks, confine himself far more stringently, were he not given footsteps to follow. So, perhaps, it is the choice he has made, to heed a lightly handled and deeply knowing command, that liberates his capacity to act. He requires the assurance of honorable companionship from someone capable of facing him fearlessly. He would not dare walk the world as he does now, without this particular guide illuminating his way.

If Wen Ning had never dared to kiss Wei Wuxian’s hand in the darkness, though, would he now walk free?

No, not that, he denies as if by instinct: he dares not imagine the possibility, or the cost.

He is here. He must have a reason to be here. So he turns his presence into an offering. He will make that be enough.

Wen Ning turns from his midnight thoughts. He realizes that it is still a warm late afternoon, streaming golden light like honey, green leaves shimmering with the motion of the breeze, the sky near the horizon rosy with billowing clouds. The Second Jade glows in his arms.

Lan Zhan is so damn beautiful. Wen Ning is delighted by the size of his cock and the unflagging hardness of his erection for long moments after his climax, just as he is by his sweetly blushing ears and strong angular jawline, not because he values those features in themselves but because they are so characteristically Lan Wangji. Wen Ning curls around Lan Zhan’s muscular thighs in his mussed bedroll, biting lightly at the skin above his knee to feel him shiver, flexing fingers strung through curls of silky black pubic hair. He waits to see what Lan Zhan will want of him next, hiding a dim and secretive smile by curving his mouth against the press of smooth skin. He leans his head on his onetime rival's, his sometime lover's, his longtime friend's, waist. So unlike his, this body in its natural wholeness, yet unflinching beneath his touch, moving merely with steadying respiration and heartbeat.

Wen Ning inhales shallowly, only in order to exhale softly through parted lips. The smallest touch of air, just so Lan Zhan will feel it, this wordless whisper: gliding over his hip, or caressing his reluctantly subsiding cock, or riffling the soft dark furriness that trails down from his navel to grow thick and lush between his legs. It's a moment of delicate joy, like the brightness of clouds passing, then, when Wen Ning hears a growl of impatience vibrate down from Lan Zhan's broad chest. A refreshing newness, akin to the endless breadth of clear skies, to feel Lan Zhan's heartbeat quicken again as he moves to grab Wen Ning by the shoulders. Lan Zhan draws Wen Ning upwards along his tall body, still lying down, until they're face to face; and takes command of his mouth in a different way, for some thorough kissing.

Wen Ning is unsurprised to feel the hot sting of Lan Wangji’s tears over both of their cheeks while they kiss. Wen Ning senses tears flowing less as the tactile experience of salty moisture and more as a glimmer of diffuse living qi. He thinks he knows what Lan Wangji is feeling, too, and can guess why. Wen Ning accepts it all absolutely, dampness and energy shifts and the choked-off gulping noises of unacknowledged wordless crying. To him, this means the honor of holding Hanguang-jun's trust.

Wen Ning considers before he makes his next move. He could take the signs of released grief with the seriousness they might be said to deserve. He could draw away and disentangle himself and pour them both tea. He could wait to hear Lan Wangji out, even if all he has to say before sleep catches up to him is a long mournful silence. He could honor the moment, solemnize the sorrow of it all.

Or he could actually make Lan Wangji feel better—which encouraging him to wallow, in the absence of adequate catharsis, won’t.

No. They aren’t done yet.

Chapter Text

Now, Wen Ning really makes use of his bead talismans. He raises his bracelet-wrapped wrist in front of Lan Wangji’s eyes, and with a sharp flex of a capability he can't define but only use, he yanks on the energy in several of the beads at once. This triggers them abruptly and fully, all at the same time, causing flash, glare, a sputter of sparks.

Watching a cascade of lights like the sparkles of a handheld firework as they drip from his arm to dissipate midair, Wen Ning realizes anew that this is his response to Lan Wangji's furious display earlier. He can answer privately, and with ferocious intensity, the shared grief which earlier manifested as Hanguang-jun's silent performance with his vanishing guqin, seen but not understood by the public. Giving and demanding full focus on physical interaction is a means for Wen Ning to match and combat that raw emotion. It's good, then, that he finds it satisfying to stand guard against intangible as well as tangible threats.

First, skin sensitivity. Not the maximum possible, but what Wen Ning knows from testing to be the greatest amount feasible to combine with any self-willed action over an extended time. He's choosing a level of enhancement well above what he would routinely employ for even such delicate work as sex. He wants to feel more, wants to not only know about but truly experience touch. The too much that comes with feeling textures and pressures and movements in their entirety—the keen responsiveness of a drawn bowstring or an exposed nerve, just like what he somehow dealt with daily back when he was living—is usually unbearable, and sometimes exactly right.

Then, second, the capacity for arousal. Not sexual sensation, in itself, but something even more basic to fighting and fleeing and fucking alike. This sense of heightened awareness should go with flushing, quivering, and increased heart rate. He does not trigger a false heartbeat, but it is still very similar to feeling a pulse quicken. The tingling feeling runs through him, from skull down spine and shoulders, collides in his fingertips and echoes back inwards to tailbone and on down to toe-tips. Wen Ning tips his head back and exhales a long harsh shuddering breath, not spontaneous but wholly heartfelt. He is overwhelmed with it all, the suddenness with which his body feels fully awake in a way that’s terrifyingly vulnerable.

Third, the edge of exertion, a heavy counterbalance to what’s otherwise wildly energizing. He wants, demands, the ache that accompanies extended athletic effort. Not actual agony, no, just the ability to feel as if further exercise verges on the impossible. Nowadays, Wen Ning never spontaneously senses any of the warning signs of an impending loss of stamina, no matter how long the watch or how hard the fight. That would be a killing numbness, a way to race unknowingly to the point of falling apart, for anyone else. He is the Ghost General, an unmatchably dangerous sentient tool of resentful cultivation. Exhaustion won't ever catch up to his undead body—not as long as he can instinctively draw more energy, whether from his inward embers of rage, or from his surroundings. With this talisman, though, Wen Ning will at least feel as if he’s going to break, going to hurt, if he’s pushed hard enough for long enough.

Out of these three talismans, the third, most of all, is plainly only mimicry, nearly mockery. While tactile acuity and heightened awareness have obvious practical uses, feeling needless physical exhaustion does not. In fact, there are other options, superficially similar, that Wen Ning deliberately doesn't use; specific ways of seeming lifelike that for him fall somewhere between unneeded and wrong. But Wen Ning is glad he did make the trial of renewing this kind of dull discomfort. It's a rightful part of his remembered regrets, finding value in an experience that a part of him, his past self, the gifted archer he once strove to become, had quietly mourned losing. For that reason, he was willing to lean into the potential of moderate pain. Then he discovered: in this, also lies the means to feel a hard-to-explain sensation that is deeply pleasurable. By activating the talisman, he's regained, for now, the chance to experience the burning exhilaration that comes from working out muscles to trembling weakness. It's artificially created, a false alarm, yes, but the sensation is real. He can, after all, still find the satisfaction of challenging his body's limits to achieve exactly what he strives for.

And, if Wen Ning anticipates accepting the emotional tension brought on by really feeling everything external that happens to him, then he also needs his actual movements to build their cumulative meaning within his body, the way his earlier dash to the campsite did not. He never sleeps, never entirely rests, never ever wears out, and so his reality is unchangingly flat until he changes it. Just feeling like he might finally collapse if he keeps going—the meaning of that is immense.

Wen Ning considers the combined effects of just these few enhancements, ones that are conceptually straightforward no matter how long they took to initially create. Accelerated and interacting, as he releases them simultaneously, they constitute an incredible transformation. The bracelet's numerous beads and the greater collection of talismans that he's acquired actually do offer him an immense range of possibility, compared to the crumbs of sensory input that Wen Ning was forced to scavenge when he first returned to conscious existence. Lan Wangji should be honored, Wen Ning decides, that Wen Ning expends such a wealth of intentional expertise and passively accumulated energy on him.

(Wei Wuxian would be pleased by this choice of how to use his work, Wen Ning thinks; and tries to stop thinking; and fails to stop.)

Yet these are subtle things, liminal things, half-things, still, when compared to the unequivocal heights and depths of what Wen Ning once asked for, back in the Burial Mounds. These are nothing, he assures himself, beside what he knows exactly how to feel and promises himself he will never again accept. Not a smothering encompassing deep touch to drive out numbness, but just the capacity to receive tactile experience. Not overwhelming pleasure, but just intensity of bodily awareness. Not blinding pain, but just the hollow half-threat of it never actually arriving, and along with that the strange satisfaction of enduring while holding off the moment of collapse.

(Sex and service and darkness and devotion, but not to Yiling Laozu. That, Wen Ning denies himself.)

Lan Wangji will be curious, now. Compelled, even, in a figurative sense. This is not quite a demand, but it is a blatant opportunity of a rare sort.

Wen Ning is deliberately displaying enthusiasm bordering on raw neediness. Along with it, he's offering up a moment of actual malleability, not just amiable agreeability, such as Wen Ning will seldom exhibit. The chance Wen Ning is holding out now begs Lan Wangji to seize upon it, and take advantage of him.

Lan Wangji's eyes widen and darken. His pulse jumps in his throat. His pupils track Wen Ning's every move closely, both wary and intrigued. There is a little danger here, unpredictable and volatile, a deliberate gamble. Nothing to be lost but what they themselves put into play willingly, it's true. But there is all the excitement of potentially winning, anyway.

Willingly, the Ghost General is inviting far more of Hanguang-jun's consuming passion than Wen Ning typically wants to experience. He's being less cautious than usual, too, taking a calculated but thrilling risk.

“Which ones?” Lan Wangji asks hoarsely. Wen Ning bares teeth at him.

“Find out,” he challenges. “Fuck me, hurt me, and find out.”

Chapter Text

Lan Wangji looks at him for a long moment, eyes flickering back and forth between Wen Ning's face, and his bracelet-wrapped wrist. Then he focuses on Wen Ning's throat a moment; Wen Ning has stopped breathing, distracted by the feeling of air moving inside his nose and the back of his throat. Lan Wangji dips his chin a little, as if half-nodding to himself as both speaker and listener of something unsaid.

Lan Zhan reaches out with one hand, and rests it contemplatively along Wen Ning's cheek.

Wen Ning feels the shape of that careful, reserved touch. He can identify the textured ridges of callouses, and the differences in pressure, ever so slightly firmer where bones underlie fingers and palm. Lan Zhan's hand is warm. The faint hint of expression in Lan Wangji's face is coolly thoughtful.

The impulse to shiver occurs to Wen Ning. He allows it to happen, shaking ever so slightly under Lan Wangji's touch.

Intentionally, Wen Ning inhales, filling his chest, and lets the breath back out slowly, stiffening his shoulders. He knew this would be distracting, having the talismans active, and indeed it is. But, his enhanced awareness also brings him deeper into the moment, further out of his perpetually anxious circling thoughts, and closer to Lan Zhan.

The increase in tension throughout Wen Ning's body, as Wen Ning deals with senses suddenly acutely insistent, shouldn't show in any visible way. But it must be apparent to Lan Zhan somehow. Thoughtfully, he traces fingers down Wen Ning's face to his throat. Fearlessly, he touches the black veins like briars, his pale gaze inscrutable.

Wen Ning shudders again. Like the feeling of wide-open pupils constricting in response to bright light, there's a shriveling stinging quality now to even small movements, painful without being quite like an actual hurt. Everything seems flinch-worthy without being actually dangerous, like the instinct to jerk back from a diagnostic puff of air delivered directly in the face. He didn't do anything to his vision, but still objects and surfaces look too real, glittering sharp-edged as if backlit.

It's the same with his hearing. They're barely touching, but he can hear Lan Wangji's heartbeat. It accelerated when Wen Ning spoke sharply to him.

Lan Wangji nods to himself again. He draws Wen Ning with him to sitting up, facing one another. Wen Ning allows him to guide his movements. It's easier than trying to think. Next, Lan Zhan leans over to kiss Wen Ning. It's a careful press of lips, this time, sensuous but not passionately sexual.

Wen Ning inhales deeply and lets his hands shake as he opens his mouth a little further, inviting. He is so very on edge; the combined effect of the enhancements make him need feel like he urgently needs to do something, yet every little motion is overwhelming. The only way this will work is if he lets go of conducting everything, and lets Lan Zhan steer. Yet he cannot only wait, either. He makes a little needy noise into the kiss and flexes his lips and stays put for a long trembling moment with his fingers clenching and letting go and clenching again. He has to do something. He has to show Lan Zhan the danger he's in. He can hardly bear to move.

After a brief pause, Lan Wangji takes the bait and tries adding just a little caress with his tongue. As soon as he draws back, inviting reciprocation, Wen Ning instead sucks Lan Zhan's plump lower lip in between his front teeth and bites.

It's mean, painful, sharp, but also just a quick nip, a press of teeth that's not at all deep enough to draw blood. It's a provocation, playing right into inviting Lan Wangji's loosened self-control. Wen Ning is careful, so very careful, with his teeth; there is nothing careless, and everything intentional, about this.

Lan Zhan's nails scrape across Wen Ning's cheek sharply, as he lets go of Wen Ning's face in order to grab him by the shoulders. He pulls back immediately on being released from Wen Ning's teeth. Lan Zhan gives Wen Ning a little shake, as if questioning his sanity. Wen Ning goes along with the motion, smiling guilelessly. He knows he's stepped over a tripwire, and ensnared himself; set off the hot reactivity that Lan Wangji continually hides. He only needs to make sure Lan Zhan knows that he knows it, too.

It's a provocation tailored specifically to Lan Wangji, to incite him and then play innocent. Wen Ning catches the moment that Lan Zhan's eyes narrow as he figures out just how deliberate Wen Ning's bite, and its effect on him, had been.

But Hanguang-jun is capable of great patience. He is never less dangerous for taking his time to decide where and when and how to strike. He is precise, as he has been since childhood; and has a mature awareness of the pitfalls of miscommunication. Lan Wangji raises an eyebrow, inquiring wordlessly.

Wen Ning lifts one hand the tiniest bit, opening it towards Lan Wangji as if to say, your turn. Oh, this is playing with fire, to tease Hanguang-jun and turn him loose, especially with all Wen Ning's senses singing like this, all exertion meant to make its mark on him. That's the point.

Lan Wangji's next inhalation is deeper, and his heart rate picks up again. The very corners of his mouth turn up, in an minute but unmistakable smile; but put together with the blazing heat and narrowed focus of his eyes, the smile looks cruel. He pulls Wen Ning down to the blankets alongside him, holds onto him, stares intently into Wen Ning's face from a handsbreadth away, all still with that far-off fierce joy in his face like the small point of incredible heat at the tip of a burning brand.

Wen Ning perceives before it even happens that Lan Wangji is about to open his mouth at last, surely to say something ruthlessly pithy and to the point. In the tiny moment between stirring and speech, Wen Ning thinks with crystal clarity, This is going to hurt.

"If you snap at me like a dog, you'll be fucked like one," Lan Wangji says dangerously.

Oh. Oh, that is a bold move. And a ruthlessly dirty one.

Well, if Wen Ning can invoke forces that are risky to loose with his choice of talismans, it's only fair for Lan Wangji to do the same. Let Hanguang-jun imply the unspoken slur of Wen-dog. Let him take brutal advantage of the fact that Wen Ning lacks Wei Wuxian's phobia. Wen Ning is just as capable as he of making play of his own feral nature.

Wen Ning snarls, a sharp toothbaring hiss and a guttural throat-noise at once, unnatural.

Lan Wangji snarls right back at him, the resonant sound in a deep chest making him seem fully capable of biting a limb off.

He's not remotely intimidated, obviously. Fine. If Lan Zhan can turn suggestive remarks into excruciating insults, so can Wen Ning.

"Does that make you a rapist, or just another beast?" Wen Ning jabs aloud.

This is the worst imaginable sort of pillow talk. It seems truly absurd with them lying alongside each other, bodies touching one another, face to face in the same bedroll, closer than even fellow soldiers sharing robes. Wen Ning never asked Lan Zhan to go easy on him, and they are both capable of devastating scorn. Neither of them mistakes it for a genuine threat in this context. It's actually very funny.

"I can be worse than both," Lan Wangji escalates, a hard thrust in this conversation. Admirers might scoff at the idea of their pure hero Hanguang-jun claiming perversion and bloodthirst; but if they had ever really seen his swordwork in action, they would stop laughing. It is a sign of bitter self-awareness of potential personal harm, in Lan Wangji, as well as an acidly honest claim to ownership of his share of generalized guilt, that he says as much.

Wen Ning verbally counterparries this low blow at speed, deflecting and strikes back in one move instead of trying to win a contest of force against force, leaving open the gaping vulnerability he's too dead to be killed by. He slides in to emotionally gut Hanguang-jun with his simple sincere response of, "I know."

Oh, that's gotten to him. Wen Ning sees the tiny tightening at the corners of eyes and lips. Wen Ning is victim, is fellow killer, is worthy foe, all at once. Wen Ning can take whatever Lan Wangji has to offer.

Wen Ning looks at him unsmiling. Someone else, someone less earnest, someone named Wei Wuxian, might grin in triumph or else smile sadly in recognition. But Wen Ning shows his affection by taking things seriously, even in play, and not making them all about himself.

So, Wen Ning nods firmly, accepting what's been said and unsaid, and moving on.

"You want it that way?" Wen Ning asks, prepared to deal with it whether Lan Zhan was implying a position, or a power play, or both. He's prepared to entertain other suggestions, too. But there have been no words wasted here, even if Wen Ning's decision to ask out loud implies coming to an agreement, hints that they should back off just a little from their earlier threatening implications. Apparently, the one sexual position Lan Wangji mentioned is indeed something he would like, not anything so uncharacteristic as talk for the sake of talk. Lan Wangji nods back, a small but decisive dip of his chin.

"Do it," Wen Ning assents. This is good, Wen Ning assesses. It's excellent that Lan Zhan is prepared to participate like this. It will help him if he takes an active role. It will be quicker, and better, if he pushes himself to the crisis that frees honest emotion. This will hopefully help to cleanse both of them of the day's miseries. It will at least entertain them both. In the unlikely event that there is any latched-on resentment cast out by their clash that takes on material form, after, well, Lan Zhan still has his qin. Wen Ning keeps smiling, looking steadily at Lan Zhan. He's hopeful.

Hanguang-jun glares back at him. With a sudden wrenching motion, Lan Zhan flips Wen Ning over prone and pins him loosely, with a knee suggestively shoved between his legs and an elbow on his back. A heartbeat later, when Wen Ning doesn't struggle, he moves fully on top of Wen Ning and bites down viciously on his upper arm. Wen Ning feels air forced out of his lungs as Lan Wangji presses him flat. He deliberately stops trying to breathe, trying to talk, allowing himself to be crushed downwards towards the cold ground under Lan Wangji's bedroll. He accepts the pain he's earned, and doesn't scream.

They are dangerous people, and they know this about themselves, and they will not be so dishonest as to refuse to put it into play. Better to allow an edge of violence. Then, along with it, they can accept the possibility of a gentleness that is earned, and not the false softness and shallow sympathy of someone who has never stood on a battlefield.

They have always fought. There are many external causes in which they find themselves in sympathy. In their personal lives, they have only ever completely agreed on one essential thing, or rather, one person. Conflict reexamined is history, is empathy, is reclamation.

Allowing his undergarments to be shredded, however, is just unnecessary. When Wen Ning feels Lan Wangji's big hand slide along his side and under the waistband of his pants, he reacts. He bucks upward, throwing Lan Wangji off to the side; Lan Zhan allows his heaving movement to succeed rather than wrestling him back down.

"You're forgetting a few things," the Ghost General says coldly. He sits up, and Lan Wangji does as well, and they glare at each other.

I don't have your Wei Ying's kinks for borrowing or destroying clothing, Wen Ning doesn't point out; not verbally.

Unlike some people, he's not crazy enough to turn cloth into rags intentionally. Just smart enough to realize that someone who is immune to hypothermia, doesn't need to be bothered by wearing ragged clothing, if that's what's available.

"All right," says Lan Zhan in a measured voice, like he's equally prepared to be excruciatingly polite to everyone for the length of a formal banquet, or to kill somebody with one stab and then neatly wipe his sword clean of blood on their clothing. His eyes are locked on Wen Ning's hands, which are currently balled into fists that make Wen Ning's knuckles ache thanks to the talismans. "Name them."

"No injury that would need fixing on either of us. Carefully help take the rest of my clothes off first, but not the bead talismans. And use plenty of lubrication." Wen Ning will do many, many things for Lan Wangji; but indulging stupidity is not one of them.

Lan Zhan blinks, thoughtful. His face shifts, wordlessly shifting through several different expressions that unfortunately are all as muted as mourning clothes, every one seeming to be another off-shade of stern. He lifts a hand, very slowly. That Wen Ning can read; it's intentionally hesitant and nonconfrontational, signaling a shift. Wen Ning lets Lan Zhan see that Wen Ning is watching him, and leaving his defenses down. Lan Zhan touches the underside of Wen Ning's chin with the tips of two fingers, a featherlight tingling touch. Finally, he looks into Wen Ning's eyes.

"I'm listening," Lan Zhan says, quietly.

Wen Ning wants to tear up at this, gentleness as superbly controlled as the earlier aggression. He's touched, that Lan Zhan thinks he deserves the tenderness of the reminder.

Both of those ways of being seen, the sharp-edged one and the soothing one, matter to him.

Chapter Text

"I know," Wen Ning says again, acknowledgement and peace offering. They may have bared their teeth, bared words like weapons. But maybe this can be a sword-dance, instead of a competitive bout. If anyone deserves all the graciousness and grace available, it's Lan Wangji.

Wen Ning unbuttons his undershirt, made with embroidered seams sealed by two rows of silk-knot buttons curving down towards his waist on both sides, though only unfastening one side is required to take it off. He goes slowly, pinching one small round button at a time, freeing them from the sewn-on long loops that are always easier to get something into and out of than a tiny buttonhole. Lan Wangji undoes Wen Ning's pants, meanwhile, and has plenty of time to unfasten his underwear as well. Wen Ning lifts his hips cooperatively, then his ankles, before shrugging the open shirt off his shoulders and upper arms. They both fold their respective removed garments, two different sets of equally neat and practiced folds. Coincidentally, they go to put the resultant tidy squares aside, where they logically belong on the stack of Wen Ning's clothing beside Lan Zhan's, at just the same time.

Lan Wangji shrugs, a small lift of one shoulder, and lets Wen Ning put the shirt down first.

Ah, the contradictions of Hanguang-jun. Exquisitely courteous and incredibly rude, both within a tea-brewing. He only ever does what he thinks he should do. Wen Ning likes him so much.

Next, Wen Ning examines the mussed bedroll, and shakes his head. He kneels in the middle and leans over to pull on the edges of the unrolled mats and blankets, flattening out wrinkles from earlier. Next he plants his hands and knees squarely, a foresquare solid table pose with spread thighs, testing that he's got everything as smooth as possible and himself as centered as he can be. Unlike earlier, Wen Ning might be able to feel any wrinkles under him. It's not perfect, not with Lan Wangji sitting placidly at the foot of the bedroll and watching him with apparent fascination, but Wen Ning decides it's good enough.

Lan Wangji takes advantage of Wen Ning's trial of this pose to begin touching him, not too intimately just yet, running hands up and down his thighs and along his calves. Thankfully, Wen Ning isn't ticklish, even with his body reporting the slide of Lan Zhan's warm hands in shocking sensual detail. He doesn't kick Lan Zhan in the face, not even when Lan Zhan switches to making wide palm circles, like he's using a polishing cloth in two opposite directions at once on some very weird sculpture, around the globes of his ass. When Lan Zhan runs a questioning thumb down the cleft of his buttocks and over his hole, Wen Ning rolls his eyes.

Dry friction would be both frustrating and uncomfortable, sticking just where things need to slide, and so Wen Ning pauses Lan Wangji, reaching back to grip hard around one thick bicep just as Lan Wangji squeezes a hand around his calf, and giving Lan Zhan a reproachful look over his shoulder. Lan Wangji acquires an expression which Wen Ning deciphers as probable annoyance, but Wen Ning deems that Lan Wangji is more likely to be directing it at himself for succumbing to distraction, than he is to be aiming it at Wen Ning. Raising his hands demonstratively, Lan Wangji lets go of Wen Ning.

With just a glance, a lean, and a long reach, no more movement required, Wen NIng flips open the already loose top flap of the exact right bag. He grabs the specific something that he'd rearranged the contents earlier to put conveniently on top. Still looking at the bag, Wen Ning moves his arm, considering angles.

Then Wen Ning casually flicks his hand fast, and releases the object he held to go flying at an absurd speed. He spins his head unnaturally fast to see the results of his blindly aimed trajectory. Hanguang-jun takes the handoff flawlessly. He grabs the closed flask of unscented massage oil that Wen Ning tossed him out of the air as if they'd practiced this impromptu throw and catch.

Wen Ning laughs out loud, and Lan Wangji smiles a little, which has the same meaning.

Wen Ning turns, seats himself tailor fashion with the soles of his feet up, and cups his hands. Lan Wangji pours liquid into them, a generous pool that Wen Ning brings down, dripping, to the crux of his thighs, just above the intentionally neglected softness there, before he allows his hands to seperate. Wen Ning spreads his thighs apart while still seated crosslegged. He leans back and presses a fingertip into himself with precision, slides it deep and comes back out and fills himself again with two fingers instead, both practice and self-control minimizing his movements. Accepting something entering him is simple, known, but the intensity of it makes him want to gasp anyway.

Lan Wangji growls impatiently again and Wen Ning frowns at him. This is largely for his benefit, as Wen Ning's body is far less delicate than a living one, but also less capable of generating moisture in any form. Wen Ning supposes that with the talismans active it might hurt him too if Lan Zhan took him dry, if it even worked at all to get his cock in. But Lan Zhan's the one who might suffer meaningful discomfort from chafing. Wen Ning is difficult to damage, and he's not scared of pain either. Wen Ning simply prefers to have things go smoothly, and is not likely to forget or overlook what he wants.

They shift into a preliminary position, Lan Wangji keeping the oil flask with him, Wen Ning moving while twisting his hair back to get it out of the way. Lan Wangji sits with his legs under him at the foot of the bedroll, so he can quickly move to kneeling up, and takes himself in hand with a slick palm, loose fist sliding easily and tightening as he goes from less than half-hard back to entirely ready. Wen Ning pulls his fingers out of himself, wipes excess oil off unnecessarily with a piece of what he carefully categorizes as later laundry, and turns fully around. He goes to hands and knees again, backing closer to Lan Wangji. He lowers his head and shoulders, for now, increasing the angle at which he's holding up his ass while he slides his knees back and his hands forward to get just a little lower. Lan Zhan's thighs brush the back of his.

Wen Ning feels Lan Zhan's erection, the thick firm base and the soft swinging weight of his balls, press between his ass cheeks as Lan Zhan finds the right height to match him and gets his knees into place. With their lower legs side by side on the mat, Lan Zhan's bracketed around the outside of Wen Ning's, they take a simultaneous deep breath. Wen Ning shifts down and forward and Lan Zhan leans back, separating their bodies by a handsbreadth. Then they move back together. Lan Zhan grabs Wen Ning's hip with his right hand, which has the long elegant qin-player nails. Meanwhile his other hand guides the head of his cock to Wen Ning's hole.

Lan Zhan pushes in. Wen Ning flexes internal muscles. One firm press gets Lan Zhan in far enough that they won't lose this connection with any slight shift in angle. He makes space for himself inside Wen Ning.

Wen Ning controlled this bodily action, too, bearing down to open for Lan Zhan, a conscious choice. He could hardly have managed to change what he was intentionally doing; the immediate report from all his senses is near-uncontrollably strong, by design and by his active choice. The stretch he feels inside is firm deep pressure, making him aware of everywhere he's tight around Lan Zhan, as well as everywhere else his body feels suddenly different, shifted around by accomodating the intrusion that feels bigger than it actually is, and is really quite big enough.

It hurts dully and feels deeply pleasurable at the same time. The push into him makes him want to feel more pressure, everywhere Lan Zhan's body is holding his open. Wen Ning cries out wordlessly, overcome. He cries out again after Lan Zhan pulls back just a little, hand quickly working around his shaft to spread more lubrication where it'll go somewhere useful, fingers incidentally rubbing against Wen Ning's tight-stretched rim, and then takes his hand away and leans forward so that just his body weight pushes him deeper by perhaps a fingerwidth into Wen Ning. He's so much, so big, so hot. He's barely getting started. He does it again.

Wen Ning usually finds this easy, convenient and reasonable and possibly even a little boring, being the receiver, the follower, the counterpoint. So he's made it difficult for himself with the talismans heightening his senses, added tension to the situation like Lan Zhan tightening the pegs for his guqin strings. Lan Zhan damn well knows it and will use it against him, to both of their benefit. All of that put together makes it so much more.

They speed up from there.

Chapter Text

A flash of lightning strikes in the distance. Evening and storm are both sweeping in, competing for the chance to darken the horizon. Long shadows grow beneath thickening clouds.

(A stray thought reminds Wen Ning of observing the Twin Prides of Yunmeng long ago, their rivalry and cooperation and bewildering fog of emotion. He huffs out a half-laugh because he can, because it’s something he’s taken back for himself, the right to express amusement over the random imagery and scattered impressions of an independent mind. The silvery-green leaves dancing and twisting like upraised arms in the rising wind can mean whatever he wants them to mean.)

The next stroke of stormlight aligns with the crest of a hard thrust, a moment when Wen Ning holds himself tense against Lan Wangji pressed as deeply inside him as possible. Their bodies align, forces meeting an equal opposite, held up by each other like the balance of compression and tension that keeps massive wooden beams stable in the nested brackets supporting the roof of a great temple.

In the next instant Lan Wangji pulling back is a warping hollowness, a deep drawing drag that’s utterly physical and still impels Wen Ning to feel need in a way that has nothing to do with a mere bodily response. Wen Ning instinctively answers that pull with a pulsation of his dark yin energies. One one level, he’s a body moving against Lan Wangji’s body, a taut curve of arse in front of his hipbones and a hand splayed out over the one hand that’s holding Lan Wangji up and a tangle of hair windblown into his face and especially a tight hole sheathing his cock. On another level, Wen Ning is a darkness like the bottom of an ocean, a cold abyss hungrily dragging tendrils of Lan Wangji’s light inwards to devour and replenish itself, taking nourishment and encouragement for the puzzlebox-complex trap-toxic layers of shadow of which the merest superficial surface-skin constitutes Wen Ning's entire embodied personality.

Fearlessly Lan Wangji slams forward into him, hips smacking into hips, fingernails embedded in the yielding toughness of Wen Ning’s skin, and this time Wen Ning laughs out loud. The joy of it, the wild awful beauty, that the hardest Lan Wangji can take him is so much less than he can take, that the uncoiling dark inside him is within his own control to let feed or leash tight again.

The sky cracks open and he feels the flash down his spine of Lan Wangji thrusting in again and he could shudder with the intensity of it. The flare of awareness burns at the back of his neck and sends sensation down all every limb at once and reminds him with the throb of his inner muscles clenched around Lan Wangji’s cock that the pressure and give of his body is something he can mold even more. He does not shudder, gives no involuntary response, because Wen Ning must command his own acts in every moment. So instead he grants the boundless hunger inside himself something else, something better, an intentional rolling ripple around Lan Zhan's cock and a shove backwards with his hips that keeps Lan Zhan deep inside even when he attempts to draws back.

In answer, Lan Zhan sinks teeth into his neck, warning and demand, like that could be a threat to Wen Ning. Lan Zhan supports himself one-armed for more deep hard thrusts, moves the hand that isn’t holding him up, and spreads fingers across Wen Ning's chest. Long nails scratch over ribs as if Lan Zhan means to claw away the spiderweb of black resentment bandaging Wen Ning’s bloodless heart.

Wen Ning allows him to pull back but redoubles the rhythm between them, fast movements of his hips back and forth coinciding with every upbeat and downbeat, in and out, of Lan Zhan’s stroke, challenging him to speed up too.

It burns, it burns where Lan Zhan’s nails are digging into Wen Ning's skin. Burns, where Wen Ning's thighs are working at inhuman speed to slam Wen Ning back onto Lan Zhan's cock, engulfing him like wet clay on the wheel rises up around a potter’s thumb pushed into a forming vessel. The spreading sense of heat inside Wen Ning seems close to spilling over somehow, overflowing like young wine in an agitated jar, but there’s no end to this effervescence. Tension wrings the tendons of his legs and burns like hot coals in his shoulders, motion burns his palms raw with friction and throbs in his knees every time he pushes back against the hard ruthless fucking.

Pain that’s no threat, only sensation. Ah, no wonder Wei Ying always loved it so, if it felt like that to him—aiya, what is he doing, letting himself think like that, think of him. It’s good, it’s good now, and it’s better that he has the control, has the limit of it, the edge past which pain stops, set in the beaded string around his hand, the words behind his teeth that would stop Lan Wangji cold.

It’s a worthwhile insanity, that he trusts Lan Wangji with that. The same as he trusts the genius talisman maker who made him those beads. No—more. Unlike Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji will defend himself. So Wen Ning will gladly defend him, too, shield him with this same strong body that can meet him stroke by stroke until even a mighty cultivator is strung tight with desperation.

Wen Ning can be here, he can feel this, and he can take it all in. He can encompass this experience, even with all those deliberately lowered defenses against himself. He can find and grasp and stay within the bright circle that means safety, the brilliance of this rare chance at not needing to hold back. He doesn't need to restrain himself, here; not any more than he already does by giving the simple pause for thought that has become second nature. Hanguang-jun is not afraid of him.

Wen Ning's skin is—is alive with sensation, alight with responsiveness but different, right and safe precisely because it’s not a mere copy of before. Only itself, sensation wrong and wonderful, nothing sensible and everything insistently immediate. Every nerve tells its own different and disjointed story. His body is a million blades of grass registering sunlight each at their own angle instead of one broad response. Every touch is the one-in-many vision of a bee’s compound eyes. In the balance point lying dead center of all those blurred images and crisscross shadows and warped falsehoods is the truth of what Wen Ning is feeling: the impression of skin on skin. Lan Wangji’s body weight leaning into him, slipping against him with the sweat of exertion. Breath hot in his ear. Tongue-tip tracing the chill lines of the veins on Wen Ning's throat: Lan Zhan choosing carefully where to bite next, even with muscles strung tight and eyes closed tight against reaching the peak of pleasure and his breath audibly heaving.

“In me,” Wen Ning says. As contrast to Lan Wangji's louder exertions, he tries for an almost inaudible, a compellingly soft voice. The rumbling of thunder nearby might have silenced him by mistake. But not so. Lan Wangji’s throaty exhalation of wordless disagreement says that his qi-enhanced senses caught Wen Ning's quick words.

“This is for you,” Lan Zhan says, refusing his offer, refusing to even come this time around. Wen Ning could argue, could complain, could force the issue, and he doesn’t want to. No, instead, he'll allow Lan Wangji to enjoy giving him this maddening bodily delight. Let Hanguang-jun lust after making the Ghost General moan under him. That there was never any intention of reaching orgasm on Wen Ning’s part makes it seem unreasonable to demand that Lan Wangji finish for him now. Lan Wangji, having come once earlier, surely has the stamina and the self-control to prolong this all night if he wants to, the way he’s wrung Wei Wuxian out sometimes just for the sake of lovingly shattering him. But what’s the greater challenge, to wreck a ship on the rocks of a narrow channel—or to steer all the way through to calmer waters?

So Wen Ning says “Yes” with a calm and even tone. He allows stubborn resistance to serve as willingness, and holds off instead of pushing too far. He doesn't break, doesn't give in, and doesn't ask to end this. He doesn’t attempt to speed up or tighten down or do anything to shock his partner over into climaxing.

Instead Lan Zhan thrusts into him again and again while Wen Ning rolls his body back against him. The rhythm they’ve found is fast and sure and endless-feeling. They ride the edge, race a receding horizon, like the floating moment of a fast gallop when all four of a horse's hooves leave the ground at once. The clouds roil above them. They fuck like that, moving against each other, fighting together. Over and over they refuse the easy satisfaction that feels like a deadly fall.

When raindrops start to land on them Wen Ning falls forward intentionally. He lowers his body to the bedroll in a controlled collapse, and keeps only the head of Lan Wangji’s cock in him. He twists, writhes, an athletic maneuver a little like going for a thigh-squeezing wrestling hold, and succeeds: without losing Lan Wangji inside him, Wen Ning turns over on his back to look at his face. Lan Wangji’s lip is bitten bloody, his eyes narrowed with determination that looks like hate, teartracks obscured by sweat-stains and strands of hair coming loose. He looks as wild and intent as Wen Ning feels. So, Wen Ning locks one leg and then the other around his waist, lifts his hips into the altered angle between their bodies, and rolls against him with just as deep and demanding a rhythm as before, but now face to face. The current half-bend of Wen Ning’s body, legs raised unsupported except by his abdomen and back, would probably be impossible for most people to very long unassisted, but for him it’s not a true challenge, just a different way to feel himself burn. Let them be unstoppable together. Let it hurt if that means it's real.

Now Wen Ning sees that the smoke of this lightless flame is an overflow of obsidian-black resentment pooling around them, flowing densely over the ground nearby. A corresponding shimmer of light permeates the air around Lan Wangji. It fractures into rainbows of colors that don’t quite exist wherever their surging and ebbing energies clash. Wen Ning’s radius of effect is smaller, fortunately, allowing the faint nimbus of Hanguang-jun’s light to wash the traces of resentment away. Purification reaches just past destruction out towards the edges of their campsite where the flux fades out into the landscape's ambient qi. Perhaps, though, that black well within goes deeper anyway, is ultimately greater than Hanguang-jun’s incredible core. The underground fire in him feels infinite.

Wen Ning smiles, sharp and uncanny, an unnatural stretch of his stiffly resistant face, feeling the black veins of resentment crawling over his cheeks. He thinks about swallowing up all of Lan Wangji’s glow, an immense satisfaction that would probably destroy them both. He watches the raindrops flash light back at them, a vision of coruscating unnamable colors of that is probably three-quarters his uncanny qi-sense. Wen Ning finds himself right on the edge of wanting and denying. He savors the absurd power he holds now by choosing not to be the devouring force he could become.

Right now, right here, fucking Lan Zhan out of pure compassion and rewarded a thousandfold for his choice, Wen Ning loves him absolutely and selflessly. He forgives Lan Zhan for loving Wen Ning, so cruelly generously, without needing Wen Ning. He forgives Lan Zhan for not being anyone else. Ah, this awful solemn awkward hilarious dutiful delightful person, Lan Zhan, Lan Wangji. Hanguang-jun, the light-bearing lord, Lan-gongzi, whose humble devotion shines brightest of everything amazing about him.

Impossible good fortune, that he, Wen Ning, Wen Qionglin, can somehow love Lan Zhan. Lan Zhan, who loves best of all his Wei Ying. Wei Ying, who is the person who made this Wen Ning and in that making also broke him, who is the Ghost General's rightful lord the Yiling Laozu, who is Wei Wuxian who always deserves so much better from him, who can't truly be trusted around him, who is behind all masks his Wei-gongzi, who must protected even from Wen Ning.

Wen Ning is deciding who he’ll be going forward. How to survive existing with the knowledge of his own undeath. How to hold the grief of being a person in a world that kills children. He is falling under the weight of it, pierced through and stuck forever in the moment of being struck down. He is standing on the very threshold of nonexistence and stubbornly saying no at any cost. He'll hold on, he'll face the horror of himself rather than abandon hope, he'll cleave his hand to the very frame of death’s doorway if necessary, hammering in a handful of bloody nails extracted from his own skull. Wen Ning will make being trapped in between life and death his own crazy choice, and reshape reality.

Again and again he's been brought back. He's killed and he's saved lives. He's taken the title of Ghost General and made it mean him. He can put this dark strength towards sheltering Lan Wangji. He will strengthen all the people he loves through him. Wen Ning's protection will keep someone better than Wen Ning can hope to be not just alive but strong and whole, a beacon of shining light.

Rain strikes Lan Wangji’s hair and wets his ribbon. Drop by drop the heavy white silk becomes translucent, showing Wen Ning more of the ardent flush extending across Lan Zhan's face from ear to rosy-tinged ear. They stay focused on one another as the rain continues, a mad impractical indulgence to allow and ignore, as it’s soaking the both of them and also all of their belongings that aren’t in qiankun bags. The unbound locks of hair at the sides of Lan Wangji's forehead, freed to wisp away untamed when he partly unpinned his hair earlier to take off the elaborate hair-ornament that usually sits atop his functional guan, are becoming saturated with rainwater. Those strands fall wetly to cling to Wen Ning’s chest, swirling like brushstrokes, joining the nest of black lines already there.

Chapter Text

Oh, and now it is Hanguang-jun who tires, Lan Wangji whose movements almost impreceptibly slow, Lan Zhan who allows himself to admit he has limits.

Weeping once again and moving slower now inside him and still deep, so deep, Lan Wangji bends down over Wen Ning and Wen Ning arches up to meet the kiss. He tastes Lan Wangji’s blood in it now, he knew he would, all the shining loveliness and cruel temptation of Hanguang-jun’s qi, tastes Lan Zhan's spit and sweat and tears and even his come from earlier kissed back out of Wen Ning’s own mouth. The taste is life, and the life in it is theirs, is both the innocent anger that cries out at injustice, and the hard compassion that confronts it and chooses to go on. The shining track of Lan Zhan's tears has the shape of Wen Ning's bloodtinged darkness. Grief and celebration define the way they move together: the flow of being that is never halted, never peaks or fades, is always dying and being born anew at once.

“Stop,” Wen Ning whispers in Lan Wangji’s ear, and Lan Wangji halts, still sheathed inside him.

“Breathe,” Wen Ning says, thrilled by the ease of command he has in this moment. He'll have what he wants, what he asks for, from Hanguang-jun. But this power, neither of them truly possesses, Wen Ning knows. Even they can be broken, but this force is indomitable. It exists only in the courage to let go. They hold it in open hands. For now, it takes the form of equal willingness to request and to receive.

Lan Wangji does as he's asked. His fast heavy breathing smooths swiftly into the measured pace of meditation, even as he stays hard as a rock inside Wen Ning. Desire hangs suspended between them like a rope bridge joining two mountain peaks. The current of concern and care flows both ways. The moment changes without changing. The rain falls all around them, splashing off grass and soil that are already wet. The droplets find their natural pathway, a slope that's almost invisible. The water joins into trickles and rivulets rolling downhill towards rivers and seas.

“You sure?” Wen Ning asks. Lan Wangji may have decided they should edge themselves up to the limits of control like this, but nothing forces them to adhere to it. Wen Ning is quite willing to take a different path than previously expected, if that seems right to him. He's here, he's himself, penetrated and filled and strong. He is always prepared to give himself over, in the right cause.

Lan Wangji laughs softly, his expression fondly scornful.

“Always,” he says adamantly.

Wen Ning nods and says, “Take your time,” with gentle playfulness.

Lan Wangji briefly closes his eyes, expressing a frustration that’s nothing to do with his willing choice to be sexually thwarted, and everything to do with Wen Ning’s stubborn teasing refusal to take him too seriously. Wen Ning's long lesson in survival did earn him the knowledge that self-confidence can encompass changing course. Experience also allows Wen Ning to think laughter, amusement that he chooses this time not to form as sound, at the familiar predictability of habit that decides them both, instead, on being so very stubborn.

Lan Zhan lays a hand on Wen Ning’s chest, stroking gently. His fingers trace, as if unconscously, a small circle, in the same approximate location where—someone else—has long since bourne a brand of the Wen sun-symbol. Wen Ning closes his eyes briefly, sad and happy at once. He reopens them with intent, and makes himself actually look at his partner, really see Lan Zhan's smiling face illuminated by the warm light of late sun descending between red-gold clouds, truly observe his features in detail and nothing else. Here he is, ribboned forehead, arched cheekbones, light eyes, nose, chin, mouth, all beautiful.

Lan Zhan deliberately shows off both his skill and his audacity in their next adjustment. He works his hips and thighs and cock subtly, withdrawing little by little and pressing in again partway. He adapts to Wen Ning's body, each little thrust and barely greater pulling back giving him another shock of perfectly aimed stimulation, over and over. Unphased, Wen Ning moves with him, giving him cooperative, easy small shifts of his pelvis, until Lan Zhan reaches the point where he can finally slip free. Then Wen Ning waits, back arched, legs open, sensation shining through him everywhere from where they're connected, speechlessly overwhelmed though he's not even trembling, with the swollen head of Lan Zhan's cock pressing him wider from inside. Insistently, Lan Zhan drags out every last movement, keeps teasing both of them, all the way, right up until he fully and finally pulls out.

Lan Zhan's cock rests a moment hot and wet and still-hard pressed against Wen Ning’s thigh. Lan Zhan's deep exhalations catch with a hint of a moan, his eyelids fluttering. Still, the small smile he wears is commandingly calm. Wen Ning smiles, and touches Lan Zhan's thigh briefly, in gratitude.

Soon, Lan Zhan kneels with upright posture beside a sprawling loose-limbed Wen Ning. Hanguang-jun is both visibly serene and as obviously erect as a rude statue. A little wrinkle appears on his forehead just below the ribbon as he realigns his qi flow, begins to will his arousal down, and diverts excess energy to steaming the rainwater right off his shoulders, all at once.

A gust carrying a new spatter of rain-drops interrupts him. Lan Wangji squints into the soggy sunset light, and frowns. Wen Ning props himself on an elbow to observe, curious.

Lan Wangji reaches his hand into the actual rain-puddle right next to his sodden bedroll. Sending a strong pulse of sky-blue qi, he evaporates it completely in a sudden puff of steam … and watches the mud-tinged water immediately roll back in.

Lan Wangji pouts. Wen Ning chuckles, and squelches as he sits up. Neither of them has fond memories of storms, to say the least. But this time together was completely worth being exposed to the driving rain.

Chapter Text

They are soaked. All their things that were not packed away are also soaked.

Wen Ning is thankful, therefore, that some small part, out of all the wild exhilaration of the interlude just past, still lingers now as a slight giddiness. Their shared strange mood, as they address the inevitable unfolding of consequences, lands right between grim recognition and gleeful resignation. That's actually ideally suited to a task that only seems to get longer the more they work at it.

Lan Wangji is, and for quite some while remains, at least half-hard. That is surely an added torment for him, added to the exasperation of repeated attempts at setting up a water-deflecting warding array strung on silk cords from the large tree. Yet he has to get the ward up, so that it can function as a tarp under which to place their belongings out of the rain, at least for long enough to extract a rain-proof tent from a qiankun bag without simultaneously pouring water inside of said tent. Wen Ning, for his part, finds quite enough frustration in rebuilding and rekindling the campfire again to provide warmth in the meantime.

Throughout, they exchange silent looks filled with edged humor. Wordlessly, they ask each other, Are you seeing this?!, about every new problem that occurs while they put the campsite to rights.

The mud puddles are merging. They both have to scurry around the campground finding misplaced objects. Lan Wangji digs out a map to be absolutely certain that they aren't in an area subject to flooding. Wen Ning moves sticks and branches to the side to encourage the water on its way out of the campground, and the sky keeps giving them more. The best they can do for the mud-inundated laundry and bedroll, at least until they have somewhere dry to put the pile after using a talisman to remove water, is to shove it all into a heap atop one of the boulders with a long stick.

Then there's the absolute madness of putting up a tent in the dark. They deploy numerous scattered light talismans, but these keep falling off from whatever they've been stuck to, despite their remarkable Yiling Laozu-developed brilliance, duration, and durability. It's utterly absurd to be putting this elaborate temporary shelter up in the rain at night when there is a town right over there and Lan Wangji could meditate away the night stuck up a tree all night long if he had to while probably improving his cultivation in the bargain and Wen Ning doesn’t sleep.

But they assemble the tent anyway. And, finally, it's set up, and everything else is sufficiently secured to at least not get worse if it rains hard again overnight, and they're done. Lan Wangji crawls inside and the tent shakes and pulses with light as he expends a ridiculous amount of spiritual energy to deploy four talismans at once, making the little sheltered interior warm and dry and cozy and clean. Rather than risk Lan Zhan coming back outside in the rain to collect him, Wen Ning helpfully grabs the qiankun bags of personal items, and bravely follows him inside.

“Good night, Wen Ning,” Lan Wangji says, his tone oddly formal for all of the familiarity of the name. Wen Ning nods to him.

Lan Wangji lies back on the replacement bedroll with his hands folded and his back straight. Wen Ning sits crosslegged and naked, his suddenly-dry mats of damp-tangled hair tucked behind his ears and otherwise uncontrollable, watching him. The light from the talismans gradually fades to nothing over the course of a quarter-shi.

After, when it’s only the muted moonlight of a clouded night through the walls of the tent that remains, Wen Ning still sees like an owl in near-complete darkness, and waits. Lan Wangji sleeps with perfect posture, but occasionally mutters in his sleep, talking to Wei Ying.

Later still, after the storm fades and the rain goes and the crickets come back out, Wen Ning finally stirs.

Wen Ning moves as if he’s memorized every object crammed into the little tent. The truth is that it’s no longer possible for him to stop seeing, so clearly woven of energy telling itself a story are all the objects around him in the world. Quietly, he takes out his comb. He lays it next to Lan Wangji’s morning toiletries, set out for convenience on a little folding shelf placed just beyond where Bichen, scabbarded, is ever at hand.

It is a good and pleasant thing, to be expected to ask to be cared for.

Next Wen Ning unfolds one light wool blanket woven with gray and rust stripes. The pattern is just discernable and the hues invisible even to the Ghost General’s eyesight at this time of night, but he fondly remembers being given the choice of colors. The blanket is of course unneeded for warmth at all. But Wen Ning smiles over it. Unfolding the fabric, he feels the ghost of a pleasant softness in his hands, still tingling with the fading effects of the bead-talismans.

Then Web Ning curls up at the foot of Lan Wangji’s bed, not next to him. Circumstances incline him to depart from other habits: sitting up for watch upon watch as would a nurse, or lying across the doorstep like a bodyguard. Instead, he spreads the blanket out above himself, and drops it open on the air to float down and drape over him. Then, he tugs the edges of it inwards, using his increasingly numb hands as a unit each, fingers folded to grip without separating the thumb, like a small animal’s clever paws. Once he finally succeeds in tucking in every edge and gathering up every corner, Wen Ning lies there peacefully, curled on his side, knees to chest like an infant in the womb.

It is a very deliberate choice, as deliberate as the routine pretense at sleep that reminds him of the rhythms of normalcy, to pick a pose like that; to place himself at the foot of Lan Wangji’s bedroll, and not alongside him. Wen Ning decides not to clutch Lan Zhan as Wei Ying would monkey-cling on him, nor to mimick Lan Wangji's rigid resting pose. Instead, curled up into a small space, covered entirely under the light weight that comes along with being considered part of the family, Wen Ning silently swears himself anew as humble protector, loyal dog, faithful companion.

The Ghost General must have a liege; there is no cause worth fighting for without people to defend. If he is imperfect in the role, if he is a little too wild, if he is, as he thinks he may be, something that will in the end slip away from humanity—still, Wen Ning chooses as best he can for now. So tomorrow, once again, he’ll trust Lan Wangji to hold his leash for the time being. It’s only fitting.

In the end, Wen Ning is neither dog nor wolf. He is both a walking memorial to his past self, and the unfolding story of everything else he has learned to do and be since his rebirth into undead form. He has become so unbearably strange and inhumanly capable because of wholly human hopes, atrocities, sacrifices, and redemptions. He is not something but someone. So, because Wen Ning is a person, too, he will not only submit to commands. He'll choose the shape of his service as Ghost General, and then step beyond that title, too, at need. He’ll give the people he loves a nudge now and then in the right direction; or simpler yet, a listening ear. Or a shoulder to lean on. Or a kiss goodnight.

Wen Ning does not sleep, but he lets himself rest there, quiet as the grave, until morning.